Uber is being sued over allegations that made headlines earlier this month that its executives wrongfully obtained medical records of woman who was raped by a driver in India.
Eric Alexander, Uber’s president of business in the Asia-Pacific region, was fired after it was learned he obtained the medical records of a 26-year-old woman who said she was raped and assaulted by her driver in Delhi in 2014. The Uber driver was later convicted of rape in 2015 and sentenced to life in prison.
According to tech news site Recode, Alexander reportedly showed her medical records to Uber CEO Travis Kalanick and then-senior vice president Emil Michael, amid other executives. Some of the executives were said to have been skeptical about the victim’s story, motivated by the suspicion that Ola, Uber’s ride-hailing rival in India, was attempting to sabotage Uber.
Now, the woman—named as Jane Doe in the case—is suing Uber, Kalanick, Michael, and Alexander for defamation, intrusion into private affairs, and public disclosure of private facts, according to the New York Times on Thursday. The lawsuit was filed in a U.S. Federal court in the Northern District of California.
According to the filing, Uber still has those records.
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The news about the medical records allegations only added to Uber’s meltdown since former engineer Susan Fowler‘s nearly 3,000-word open letter in February, exposing a company culture rife with sexual harassment and other abuses.
Since then, the company has seen a number of departures from top leadership ranks—including Michael, who left the company earlier this week. Kalanick announced he will be taking a leave of absence—both for self-improvement as well as to grieve for his recently deceased mother—from the company as the recommendations from the investigation by former Attorney General Eric Holder were released this week.
